


There's a House in Hawkins, Indiana, Where Music is Playing and a Door is Locked

by runs_in_the_family



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Blood, Dissociation, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Non-Con Aftermath, Originally Posted on Tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-21
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-11-01 13:35:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17868218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runs_in_the_family/pseuds/runs_in_the_family
Summary: It's dark and there's blood and he knows he should feel something.





	There's a House in Hawkins, Indiana, Where Music is Playing and a Door is Locked

       He’s bleeding. If he wets his lips, he gets the sting of blood on his tongue and the unmistakable sensation of raw, torn skin pulsing under soft pressure.

       He can’t feel it though. The pain.

       He should be able to. He’s licked enough blood across his lips to know that there should be pain. But there isn’t.

       He’s bleeding. On the inside, above his eye. He can feel the birth of a swell that’s only going to get worse. It’ll get larger, more tender, maybe obscure his vision slightly. He can feel the throbbing. Thinks that, were he able to touch it, it might hurt.

       Right now, it doesn’t. He feels the swell, but not the pain.

       He’s bleeding. On the inside, though some has made it’s way out. It’s trickled out and spread across the tops of his thighs. There’d be more, but he’s been told to hold it in. Not the blood, but the rest of it. He’s been told to keep himself full and that’s what he’s doing. Holding tight to what he doesn’t want sitting inside of him.

       He’s torn and soft and bleeding but he does it. Because all the pain he should be feeling, he’s not. So he forces the worn muscles closed and keeps himself full.

       He’s bleeding but he isn’t crying. Not anymore. The tears stopped shortly after the pain did. Once the pain vanished, the tears were for nothing, so they vanished too.

       He was asked, over and over, why he was crying. Asked as though he were being a nuisance, as though he were overreacting, ruining everything, as though he didn’t realise how much he should have been enjoying it.

       Answering had been too much for him to manage. Any words were. So he’d cried.

       He’s bleeding but he’s also breathing. Slowly, carefully, keeping it even. Focusing on the rhythm so he has some control. So that something belongs to him, even if it’s just his breath.

       The rhythm breaks when a hand settles on his back. He chokes slightly, then seals his lips tight.

       “You still holding it in?”

       His lungs stutter as he nods against the pillow.

       The hand rubs back and forth, almost congratulatory, then glides down his spine.

       “Feel good?”

       And because he still can’t feel the pain, he nods again.

       Fingers smooth over his ribs. Prod the rising bruises.

       “You imagine what they’d say if anyone found out?”

       He shuts his eyes against the threat of a tear.

       “They wouldn’t care about anything else. All they’d remember is who took it up the ass like a bitch.”

       And because he knows what’s really being said, he nods a third time.

       The hand falls away. Then the weight on the side of the bed lifts.

       He’s told to get up. He’s told to put his clothes on and he’s warned against letting anything out. He’s told he has to keep it in.

       He thinks that if he could feel the pain, he wouldn’t be able to do it.

       When he’s dressed, after he’s slowly pulled everything on, he stands a little crooked in the centre of the bedroom. Watches the end of a cigarette burn in the dark.

       He doesn’t move when boots start coming towards him. Just stays as he is, sloped and silent. He’s pulled flush against a denim-clad chest and an arm snakes around his back.

       He’s glad for the bleeding above his eye, the swelling already obscuring his vision. He doesn’t have to see the face.

       Slowly, the hand on his back glides downwards. Past the base of his spine, over the curve of his ass. It cups him right where he should feel an ache.

       He’s asked again if it feels good. This time, he doesn’t nod.

       The hand squeezes and he’s glad he can’t see the face.

       “Let me feel it.”

       He goes cold. He doesn’t decide to let go. Just feels himself start to empty.

       It soaks through his briefs. Seeps through his jeans. He’s told to push as hard as he can and he wonders if maybe he won’t ever feel pain again.

       A stain starts to spread at the seat of his jeans and the hand pushes against it, squeezing at the wet patch.

       He’s told that being able to take so much means that he really wanted it. Then he’s told to fuck off.

       There aren’t many left at the party. Numbers had been dwindling an hour ago, when he’d been guided into an empty room and wrestled to a bed. Now, there’s hardly anyone left to see his ruined face and uneven walk.

       He’s outside before he finds his rhythm again, before his lungs begin to fill and empty as they should. He focuses on the air moving in and out. Nothing else.

       Until a voice reaches his ears. Asking where he’s been. Explaining that he’d been thought to have left. Joking about hooking up with somebody, and then it cuts short. Because shining eyes reach his face, and the perfect smile beaming at his presence suddenly shatters.

       He’s asked what’s happened. He’s asked who rearranged his face. A hand reaches for his arm and he throws a wild punch.

       He’s bleeding. Not from his lip, not anymore. Or from where the blood trickled out and stained his thighs. But he’s bleeding, he knows he is. Because now he can feel the pain of it.

       He’s bleeding and he’s crying and Steve’s trying to calm him down.

       He’s held tightly and told to breathe. He’s asked again what happened. Even with the threat of being seen by scattered stragglers, lips press against his cheek and he’s pleaded with to tell his boyfriend what’s wrong.

       He doesn’t know what he says. It’s not the words, not the real ones, because he doesn’t think he can ever say them. But whatever he says is enough. Enough for Steve to understand, even if he’s not quite sure that even he understands yet.

       They leave the party in silence. Steve drives. He focuses on his rhythm.

 

* * *

 

 

       He showers because Steve tells him to. He watches red drain down the plug hole and doesn’t bother to wash his hair.

       They lie in Steve’s bed and his boyfriend feels the need to ask if he can hold him.

       Eventually, he falls asleep.

       He doesn’t dream and it’s the greatest kindness he’s been granted all night.

       After what the clock tells him is five hours, he’s awoken by a movement in the bed. Steve, climbing underneath the covers, assures him that he’s only returning from the bathroom.

       He runs his eyes over his boyfriend, knowing full well when a lie passes those lips.

       Though he may never receive a confirmation, he knows where Steve’s been. He nods slightly and decides he doesn’t care. Allows warm arms to wrap around his shoulders and ignores the scuffed knuckles. The dirt beneath the nails. The scratches on the wrists.

       He can see the bat, sitting near it’s usual spot. Tucked behind a coat in the corner of the room. He always keeps an eye on it. The memory of Max bringing it down between his legs is never far from his mind.

       He knows it’s not where it was five hours ago.

       Pressing his cheek against a shirt that bares the smallest fleck of blood, he focuses on Steve’s rhythm. Holds on to the rise and fall and synchs himself to it.

       Eventually, he falls asleep.


End file.
